The Man of Gold (20 page)

She felt a surge of hope, a quick running of the blood.

‘Yes, but ’ow you going to do that, Unwin?’

Miss Unwin’s eyes shone with the light of battle.

‘By having a good long talk with that little servant girl in the house in Great Marlborough Street,’ she said. ‘You remember I told you about her?’

‘Cheeky little beggar, by all accounts.’

‘Yes. And all the more ready to tell secrets she should not.’

‘So when you going to go? An’ can I come with you?’

‘Tomorrow,’ said Miss Unwin. ‘Tomorrow morning, and of course we’ll go together.’

Then she remembered.

‘Oh, but the twins. I cannot let them go once more without their lessons.’

‘But you’ll ‘ave to, won’t you?’ said Vilkins.

With sinking heart Miss Unwin assented.

Perhaps once more would not matter. Perhaps just one more morning away from her duties would not result in the girls, already spoiled enough, getting up to worse mischief. And one more absence might be all she needed. With some good evidence that Miss Cornelia Fulcher had made some attempt to acquire some poison or other she could, yet again, go to Inspector Redderman. And this time the case she presented would be the one that in the end would stick.

Next day all her hopes seemed to be being rewarded. The twins, when she had given them each one of Mrs Molesworth’s books to read, a pleasant occupation she thought, made no difficulties about being left on their own once again. Mrs Miller in her kitchen was quite happy to let Vilkins go out on a carefully unspecified errand. And when they reached the house in Great Marlborough Street the slatternly little girl of the establishment was outside on the step, scrubbing at it with a block of holystone in no very industrious way.

Miss Unwin placed Vilkins in the background and boldly tackled the girl.

‘Do you want to earn half a crown?’

The girl looked at her with patent suspicion.

‘I seen you afore.’

‘Yes, you have. And you told me a little about your lodgers then. I want to know more now. Do you want that half-crown?’

‘I want three shillin’.’

‘You shall have them.’

‘First?’

Miss Unwin took a florin from her purse.

‘The last shilling comes when you have told me as much as you know.’

The girl stood sulkily considering. ‘What yer want ter know then?’

‘Everything you can tell me about Miss Fulcher. What she does with her days. Where she goes shopping. What she buys. What she has bought and keeps in the rooms. That will do to begin with.’

‘Then I’ll ’ave ter ’ave another florin. An’ straightaway.’

Miss Unwin longed to box the wretched creature’s ears.

‘Not a penny more until I hear what I want to hear,’ she said.

The girl smirked.

‘Yer won’t learn noffink wivout what I tells yer,’ she said. ‘An’ I won’t tell wivout me money.’

‘You’ll get your money, another two shillings if you like, when you have given me your information.’

‘No,’ said the girl. ‘An’ yer needn’t think you’ll get anyfing out o’ old Mr Bessom either. Too drunk ter tell yer. Never out o’ the Grapes over Seven Dials, ’e ain’t.’

Miss Unwin felt a dart of impatience. Had the luck which had been with her all morning run out? If this snot-nosed creature delayed telling her what she wanted much longer it was quite possible Mrs Bessom would emerge from the house to see why her girl was being so long over cleaning the step.

But to yield to her blackmailing would be only to give the creature the chance of making new demands.

‘You will tell me what I want, or you will see me no more.’

‘I’ll keep yer ruddy florin then.’

‘But you’ll get no other.’

‘Oh, orright then. If yer must.’

‘Well now, tell me: Miss Fulcher, does she go out shopping every day?’

‘Nah. Too mean.’

‘Does she never go out then?’

‘Yeh. Sometimes.’

‘To the shops? Do you know which ones?’

‘She goes to the oilman’s. Buys fly papers by the dozen. Silly cow.’

Fly papers. Miss Unwin’s interest leapt up for one instant. But the arsenic in fly papers was not what had poisoned old Mr Partington.

‘What else does she buy?’

‘Dunno. Goes ter the chemist. Always a-coming back wiv little bottles wrapped up in white paper an’ sealed wi’ wax.’

‘Does she? And what is in those packets?’

The girl’s eyes took on a look of fierce cunning.

‘Dunno, do I?’

‘I think you know very well. Don’t tell me you don’t poke and pry in Miss Fulcher’s bedroom when you go in to sweep.’

‘What if I do? You ain’t going ter tell on me, are yer?’

Miss Unwin very much would have liked to have gone straight into the house and told Mrs Bessom just what her maidservant did. But the girl was right. She was not going to’tell on her.’

‘Never mind telling. What is it that Miss Fulcher buys in those packets from the chemist?’

The girl considered. Doubtless she was debating whether this was the moment to raise the bidding.

But she had left it too late.

The door behind her was jerked suddenly back and in the doorway stood a woman who could only be Mrs Bessom, a broad, formidable figure, red-faced and beetle-browed beneath a wide-frilled white cap jammed on her head with the force of a steam-hammer.

She took one look at Miss Unwin.

‘And what may you be wanting?’ she demanded.

Miss Unwin was at a loss for an answer to the barked-out question the Fulchers’ landlady had challenged her with. Or she was so for more long moments than she cared to think about. But at last the resources of her mind produced something.

‘Good morning,’ she said, forcing a cool tone on to herself. ‘I am afraid I strayed from Oxford Street and am now quite lost. I thought to inquire from your girl here, and somehow, I know not how, we fell into conversation. I am sorry if I kept her from her work.’

She had said too much, and she knew it. But she had provided herself with a path of retreat and this she took.

Not until she was in the bustle of Oxford Street did she stop to discuss with Vilkins the sudden defeat of a campaign that had seemed to be going so well.

‘Oh, Vilkins, Vilkins, so near and yet so far.’

‘Yeh. Fancy coming out an’ spying on the girl. I wouldn’t stand for it meself.’

‘Well, I dare say you would lose your place if you behaved as badly as that creature.’

‘Yeh. I’m surprised she ain’t been thrown out on ‘er ear long ago.’

‘Ah, I think I know the reason for that. Mrs Bessom, fierce though she looks, must like to leave that sort of thing to her husband. And Mr Bessom is a weak man.’

‘In that gin palace at Seven Dials,’ said Vilkins knowingly.

‘Yes, the Grapes, didn’t the girl say? Do you know of it then.’

‘In course I do. As rough a place as there is going. But the gin’s cheap, if you can stand the company.’

And it was then that a terrible idea came into Miss Unwin’s mind.

‘Vilkins,’ she said, ‘I think that I must visit the Grapes.’

‘Visit the Grapes? Unwin, you gone off your nut?’

‘No. No, I know it is an insane proposition in many ways. But, don’t you see, in the Grapes I could meet Mr Bessom. And Mr Bessom, I dare swear, would tell me everything that little girl was going to.’

‘You’re right there, I should think. Lazy layabout like ‘im he’d ‘ave nothing better to do than poke ‘is nose into the lodgers’ business.’

‘So you see, dear, rough though Seven Dials is, I must make my way there and take a drink at the Grapes, come what may.’

‘You’ll do nothing o’ the sort.’

‘But I must, Vilkins, I must. Little though I relish the idea.’

‘You’ll do nothing o’ the sort. But I will. An’ that’s all there is to be said about it. You, if you went in one o’ them ginshops down Seven Dials, you wouldn’t last ten minutes. Not five. But I’d be all right. I kept to the rough, didn’t I? I wouldn’t go too far wrong down the Grapes.’

‘No, Vilkins.’

‘Yes, Unwin.’

‘But why should you do this for me? I am the one who wants to find a case against someone other than Richard Partington. It cannot mean much to you.’

‘It don’t mean nothing. Not ‘im.’

‘Then you shall not go.’

‘He don’t mean nothing to me. Why should ‘e? Ain’t seen all that much of ‘im, ‘ave I? But you mean something to me, Unwin. You mean a ‘ell of a lot to me. You’re the only friend what I ever ‘ad.’

And, though there was more argument, Miss Unwin knew that with those words she was going to let Vilkins
venture into Seven Dials and rely on her to find out at the Grapes from weak Mr Bessom what it was that Cornelia Fulcher bought at the chemist’s shop.

But when after Vilkins had served dinner that evening – she spilt nothing, a rare occurrence – she came to Miss Unwin’s room dressed once more in her garish bonnet it was with a mind full of misgivings that Miss Unwin let her go.

‘You won’t-Vilkins, dear, you won’t let anyone …’

‘Don’t you worry your ‘ead,’ Vilkins said. ‘I’d like to see the man what thinks ‘e can ‘ave ‘is way with me.’

‘Well, dear, I hope you’re right. And you’ve got the cab money safe?’

‘Tucked in me garter. An’ there ain’t no one going to get at it there.’

But nevertheless, even before the earliest time it was likely that her friend could have completed her errand at the Grapes Miss Unwin was fidgeting and waiting for her, glancing through the curtains of her window every two or three minutes hard though she tried to stop herself.

It was for this reason that the sounds coming from the landing took some time to impinge on her consciousness.

The children, she thought at once, when the little scuffling noises she had heard without hearing finally came to that forefront of her mind. Surely they cannot be doing again what they did the night I found out about old Mr Partington’s hoard?

Nevertheless she kicked off her shoes – she was still fully dressed, ready to welcome Vilkins on her return – and hurried out to look into the twins’ room. And those two new white beds with the pink-knotted curtains were empty.

Miss Unwin ran downstairs.

What were the girls doing? Surely now, when their father was giving them all and more that they could wish for, they were not setting out to steal once again? Grave though their fault was when they had attempted to take
one of the sovereigns in the hoard they had discovered, it was something that could be understood of children who had never been allowed into a sweetshop. But now …? Could they really be stealing once more?

In the hall they were nowhere to be seen. Miss Unwin, grim faced, set out for the basement and the kitchen.

And, as she crept down the stairs, there where it should have been pitch dark she saw the glow of candlelight.

But what could the girls be wanting down in the basement? Their grandfather’s gold had long ago been taken away. And they could hardly want anything from the larder. The meals they ate now were so large that it was a wonder they did not become ill. Let alone the sweets their father kept offering them now he was home again.

Soft-footed and cautious, Miss Unwin peered round the corner at the foot of the stairs towards the clearer glow of the candle.

And, facing her, on tip-toe, with secret intent looks, there were Louisa and Maria. Maria was holding the candle, not the guttering stub of that earlier expedition but a tall white candle in a pretty china candlestick from their bedroom. And Louisa had in the cupped palm of her hand something she was at pains to keep from spilling.

‘Girls!’

Louisa screamed and from her hand there fell a stream of bright yellow powder. The candle in Maria’s hand wavered dangerously.

‘Give me that,’ Miss Unwin said, stepping forward and grasping the pretty china stick before the candle set the whole house on fire.

She turned to Louisa.

‘And what is that that you have got there?’

‘Nothing, Miss.’

‘Don’t be silly, Louisa. It is not nothing. What is it?’

‘It – It really is nothing. I mean, it is of no consequence.’

‘Leave me to be the judge of consequence. What is it
that you have there? I will not ask you again.’

‘Then don’t, Miss.’

Louisa’s face was a study in sullen mutinousness.

Miss Unwin put down the candle and took the girl’s wrist firmly in her hand. She brought the clenched fist up closely to her nose.

‘Mustard,’ she said. ‘You have got a handful of mustard powder there. What on earth are you doing?’

‘Nothing, Miss.’

‘Nothing? What has got into you tonight? I come down here when I find you out of your beds and I catch you clutching a handful of mustard. You cannot tell me then that you are doing nothing.’

Louisa stood in silence.

‘Maria, what were you doing?’

But before Maria could answer, her sister flashed her a look which said plainly as if it were written out,
Say nothing
.

‘We weren’t doing anything, Miss Unwin.’

‘Maria, I expected better things of you. Coming down to the kitchen and possessing yourselves of mustard is not doing nothing. Now, what is all this about?’

But, under Louisa’s baleful stare, Maria, too, was now silent.

Miss Unwin looked at the pair of them. This was altogether unusual behaviour. Certainly, when she had first come to the house neither girl was at all ladylike in manner. But they had quite soon become responsive to what she said and before very long they had learnt too, to obey. Yet now … This rebellious muteness. It was altogether new.

She sighed.

‘Very well. Go up to your beds now, and go straight to sleep. Not one word to each other, understand. And in the morning we will talk about this again.’

Severe as a prison wardress, she escorted them back to
their room, saw them into bed, extinguished their candle and waited outside until she was happy that no further rebellion was contemplated.

Then she went back to her own room.

And saw the clock.

It was late, very late, and Vilkins had not returned from dangerous Seven Dials.

She should never have let her go. Especially not on her own.